[music playing] Hi.

My name is Alex Suleski.

I'm the wildlife program coordinator at Shaver's Creek, Penn State's nature center.

Join me for A Season at Shaver's Creek.

It'll be a look back at what the wildlife around Shaver's Creek has been up to this fall and what they've been doing to prepare for the winter.

[music playing] We've been seeing this mama raccoon and her kits in the area for a few months now.

They were likely born in the spring, and they'll probably hang out with her for about until next spring.

They spend about a year learning from their mom, until they're big enough to go off on their own.

[music playing] We see raccoons a lot around water.

It's a pretty important resource for them.

But it's not super common to see them swimming upstream like this raccoon is doing.

Deer, like cattle, are ruminant mammals.

Which means, when they're eating plant matter, they'll let it digest a little bit and then they'll bring it back up into their mouth to start chewing it again.

This clip is kind of neat because you can see that process in action.

Here, we see this pretty big 10-point buck crossing Shaver's Creek in a slower moving pool.

We've been seeing this guy for a while around the Center.

A lot of our staff has seen him coming and going in front.

He also sort of crosses down by our beaver dam a lot.

In the same spot we saw the buck crossing the creek, we see this beautiful, four-foot tall great blue heron hunting for fish and other aquatic snacks.

They're not always successful, but a lot of the time they come away with a meal.

Sometimes the herons are very successful, as we see with this individual catching a fish that I think any fisherman would be proud of catching.

[music playing] It was pretty neat to see this trio of pied-billed grebes swimming up Shaver's Creek.

We rarely see multiple together.

These waterbirds will dive for prey, hunting for fish, frogs, crustaceans, and lots of other invertebrates.

Here, we have a pretty common sighting at Shaver's Creek, a pair of mallards swimming upstream.

We've got a male, with the green head, and a female with him.

They're often seen in pairs or groups together-- a pretty commonly sighted bird, but really gorgeous.

Now, this is a pretty rare sighting.

The mink is a semi-aquatic weasel species that we really don't see very often, especially not during the day.

They live in our wetlands and they're a specialist when it comes to hunting muskrats.

Now, these two rodents are muskrat.

They look a lot like beavers, but a lot smaller, with more of a rat-like tail.

But what's kind of cool is they've been found to sometimes spend the winter with beavers in their lodges together, kind of cohabitating as roommates.

[music playing] I love beavers.

They're what's called a keystone species, which means that they have a really huge impact on the environment and on tons of other species around them.

They're a real benefit to have.

They build firebreaks for wildfires.

They help mitigate pollution by slowing down stream flow.

And they're the most active in the fall.

So it's really fun to see them out and about on the trail cams.

[music playing] Since beavers don't hibernate, they need to build up food stores for the winter.

So they'll collect bark and roots, stripping it off trees, like we see this beaver doing here.

Now, beavers are one of the few mammals that can actually digest cellulose, the woody plant material, not just the leaves.

So here, we can see the beavers taking a tree down.

And then they're going to strip the bark off of it and the branches farther up for food and for building materials.

Just look at that cute little guy.

So as beavers are collecting the sticks and branches, they'll pull them over to their dam structure.

They'll stick them in there, and then they'll push mud up into the dams to waterproof them.

They do a lot of this work in the nighttime, in the evening.

They're what's called crepuscular.

So they're the most active around dawn and dusk hours.

Now, beaver kits, the young beavers, they'll stick around for up to two years, learning from their parents.

They'll help out with dam and lodge construction.

In their lodges, a beaver family can be anywhere from four to sometimes six beavers.

Here, we get a view of the tree's perspective as it's being taken down by the beaver.

Unfortunately, I didn't get there quite fast enough to save the camera, but the beaver was nice enough to give us a closeup shot.

[music playing] Thanks for watching this episode of A Season at Shaver's Creek.

We've got a lot of great programming coming up this spring.

Feel free to check out our website for more details.

We'll see you again in a few months for a look back at what the wildlife was up to this winter.

Until then, keep exploring.

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